CRM, lead flow and sales techniques · Inbound business strategy and alignment
Turn the year's goals into key results each team can move and score.
An OKR cascade turns a few company objectives into numeric key results, then into the key results each team picks to move. Teams score them at the end of every quarter. This page covers the SMART goal rewrite, the cascade grid and the scoring, and ends with a scored cascade.
Scope, fee, reporting and term are agreed in writing after we have read your brief and spoken to you.
In one paragraph
An OKR cascade turns a few company objectives into numeric key results, then into the key results each team picks to move. Teams score them at the end of every quarter. This page covers the SMART goal rewrite, the cascade grid and the scoring, and ends with a scored cascade.
A machine maker in Coimbatore announces at Pongal that the year's goal is to grow. By July the sales team is chasing enquiries, the workshop is chasing deliveries and the accounts clerk is chasing old dues, and none of the three knows how it connects to the others. Ask the owner what grow meant and the answer changes with the day.
An objective says where you want to be. A key result is a number that tells you whether you got there, with a baseline, a date and an owner. The cascade is how each team picks the key results it can move, rather than receiving a slice of someone else's number.
The owner sets the objectives and each team head writes their own key results. It replaces targets that live in a speech. It sits beside the sales goal cascade, which splits the revenue number into products and territories in rupees; this page handles the wider objectives that revenue is one part of, and how you score them.
Where this sits
Topic 13 of 13 in crm, lead flow and sales techniques: inbound business strategy and alignment. Company-level planning that keeps sales, marketing and service aligned.
- The topic before
- Selling after the sale
If you want this done for you
Next year's number was picked because it sounded ambitious, not because it was worked out.
The work
What this is actually like.
“An objective is a sentence and a key result is a number”
Be the supplier dealers call first when stock runs short is an objective. Fill-rate on dealer orders from a baseline to a target by March is a key result. If a key result has no number you can look up in your own records on the first of the month, rewrite it.
“Score honestly or do not score”
Score each key result from zero to one at the end of the quarter. If every key result reaches full marks, the targets were too soft. If nothing moves, the targets were wishes. Aim for a stretch where the key results land partway, and write down why each one stopped where it did.
“Teams choose, they are not assigned”
The workshop head picks the company key results that production can move and writes its own. Splitting a revenue figure equally by headcount tells a team what to do and never what they can change. Choosing creates ownership.
“Run it on your financial year”
Your quarters start in April, July, October and January. The third quarter carries Diwali and the fourth ends on 31 March with collections and year-end accounts. Set the quarter's key results with that calendar in front of you. Keep scores apart from incentive pay in the first year, since people set soft targets when pay depends on the score.
What we do
What you end up with.
The documents this topic produces, what each one is for, and how you know it is finished.
The SMART goal sheet
Every current target rewritten with metric, baseline, target, deadline, owner and where the number is counted. The sales head fills it from what people say today.
Result: Finished when every target has a baseline you can look up and a date inside the financial year.
The company objectives page
Up to five objectives for the year, each with one to three key results. Written by the owner and read aloud to the team heads.
Result: Finished when a team head can say in one breath how their work moves one of the key results.
The team cascade grid
Columns: company key result, team objective, team key result, owner, source of the number. One block per team.
Result: Finished when every team key result links to a company one and none of the company key results is left unowned.
The quarter scorecard
Per key result: start, target, actual, score, one line on why. Reviewed in one meeting at quarter end.
Result: Finished when the meeting closes with one key result dropped, one carried over and one new.
Why us
Why owners pick GullySales over an agency.
Marketing and sales, as one job
Most agencies stop at the enquiry. We also fix what happens after it: the reply, the follow-up, the quote and the CRM.
The person on the first call does the work
No account managers in between. You are never handed to someone you have not met.
A baseline before anything starts
Your numbers are written down on day one, so every later report compares against something honest.
The fee in writing, split three ways
Our time, your media spend and production on separate lines. You always see what goes to us.
No guarantees we cannot keep
The term is agreed in writing and never a default twelve months. We never promise a ranking or a lead count, because nobody controls those.
One office, and we say so
Nagarbhavi, Bengaluru. We work across India by call and WhatsApp and travel when a session needs to be in person.
#257, 3rd floor, Sri Nanjundeshwara Complex, Nagarbhavi 8th Block, Outer Ring Road. How we work.
Your brief
Tell us what you need, and we will read it before we call.
Eight short steps about your business, what you want and who decides. Most questions are a tap, and you can skip any you would rather answer on the call.
FAQ
Questions owners ask before they call.
Not here? More answers, or ask on WhatsApp.
How many objectives should a small business have?
What if we miss a key result?
Is OKR the same as a KPI?
Do we tie this to bonuses?
How much does it cost?
How long is the contract?
How soon will we see results?
Who will actually do the work?
What do you need from us?
What if we are not happy with the work?
Where to go next
The work that carries this topic further.
The rest of inbound business strategy and alignment
Or read all of crm, lead flow and sales techniques.
Your next practical step
Tell us what you are trying to grow, and we will read it before we call.
Eight short steps, mostly taps. Skip anything you would rather answer on the call.